#and I know the team knows Zelda games

[quibbs126]

I remember seeing these things (the little hole in the wall) during my first playthrough, and I was CONVINCED that at some point in the game, we would have a section, or more likely obtain the ability, to go small and go through these doors

But no, there is never any explanation to what these things are or why they’re there, they just are

[ganondoodle]

i am being so brave trying so hard to hold back writing a rant about that 'minimizing narrative noise' comment on totk sage concept art bc its actively flying around in my head like the worlds most annoying fly

[jellyfishvibes]

Getting hella frustrated about zelda wikis and how limited each are but not insane enough to join the wiki team to add all the shit their missing

[yourfatherjustinmcelroy]

I had a dream that I was playing a new Zelda game with Jon matteson and in this dream we were friends and were hanging out on a couch talking and leaning on each other and at one point I put an arm around him or something and he like, shrugged it off and looked at me and was like “Hey... I’m not into you like that, that’s not cool.”

And I totally panicked like “Dude I promise I was not trying to get with you I’m so fucking sorry I’m just a physically affectionate friend and that’s how I hang out, if you aren’t comfortable with that of course I will obviously not do it but I promise I wasn’t hitting on you at all.”

And he was like yeah whatever... in a way where it was kinda clear he didn’t believe me. We then scooted away from each other and awkwardly played the game for like twenty more minutes and he left after that and I texted my other friend like “I think I fucked up, he thought I was hitting on him” and they were like “it’s over bro” and I felt soooo bad for making him feel uncomfortable and I tried to play the Zelda game and I couldn’t because our save was the both of our names and I just kept getting reminded of how bad I fumbled the friendship

And when I woke up I was like why the fuck did something out of my neurodivergent childhood manifest with Jon fucking matteson???

Anyway... hey Jon if you ever see this I promise I wasn’t hitting on you, I don’t wanna complicate this friendship with romance anyway

[awkwardpossum0]

Just working on stuff so I show them cuz I need people to tell me to finish them :)

Mario Kart Link by @gaylactic-fire

My Skyward Sword Link design for a post game story I wanna sketch up

Another Spirit Tracks link in a cluttered room to replace the one I have up

[luxrayz64]

i need to be put down someone needs to just erase the concept of the legend of zelda from my brain forever because totk and the team behind it is not gonna stop pissing me off ever. for fucks sake aonuma limitations are not a bad thing and players often cannot be trusted with player freedom. if you want me to come up with a creative solution to a puzzle you need to put limitations on it.

the most well regarded parts of breath of the wild - the great plateau, eventide island - are well regarded because of the limitations they put on the player. you cannot have meaningful progression in a game without limitations.

people crave efficiency, and without limitations in place, players will take the path of least resistance. they won't engage with the possibilities of the ultrahand mechanic in order to take that korok from point a to point b - they'll make the hoverbike, or just pick the fucker up and walk it there. players have to limit themselves in order to reach the games full potential, and idk about you guys but im not fucking doing that.

which is why when aonuma says that he thinks the only reason people prefer the formula of the older zelda games is nostalgia, it makes me want to goddamn hit things. I dont want to create my own fun! that is your job! I never minded the linearity of the older games, because it challenged me - to solve that puzzle as intended, fight that enemy as intended. that 'as intended' is important here, because there was no quick and easy trick to get around it. I couldn't rocket shield my way around a dungeon. I had to engage with the game on the game's terms, and the more freedom players have, the less players will be willing to do that.

and for sure, there is fun to be had in 'cheating' the game. I had fun climbing around the fire temple to beat it in unintended ways (because the puzzles were boring and it felt poorly designed and I got sick of trying to beat it the 'intended' way), and on my second go around of botw I learned windbombing specifically to try and cheat the shrines.

but it gets to a fucking point in totk where you at no point have to actually engage with the game, because there is always a 'correct' answer that does not challenge the player at all. there is always the hoverbike, always a rocket shield. there is no reason to engage with the games mechanics, and at what point is it even worth playing? and the answer to that question is different for everyone, but personally I just don't see the fucking point in it

[arkon-z]

TOTK is a good game and it's got a good story to boot. But the thing is, that story doesn't connect very well to BOTW. It really does read like a sequel fic of someone who loved the source material but really wanted to gush about how awesome the Zonai were. I'm not a game dev or writer, so maybe this is just my inexperience showing, but with two delays, you'd think they'd have enough time to polish up the story.

[amiharana]

some of my thoughts on link, zelda, and the champions

this post actually started off with me trying to answer the last part of this anon's ask, and then it spiraled into something else, so i'm going to have to make another post about the actual idea 😭 for now, you can have this long-ass fucking thinkpiece i typed up because i love the champions dearly and i wanted a much larger presence from them as i played botw. this post is really long so if you want to read it, please sit down and have a snack while you read.

so the last part of anon's original ask was about the champions singing together and the idea of a found family—

anonymous asked:

Also: imagine all champions, Link and Zelda hanging out on one of the Divine Beasts and singing a song together (i am very weak to champions being a found family)

like you're so #real for this anon. i honestly do hope we get more champions content in TOTK because nintendo completely missed on not expanding on a found family dynamic between link, zelda, and the champions. sure there's the champion's ballad DLC and age of calamity (i haven't played either of these. sorry. i will soon!), but that's not.. they're still dead in the DLC and AoC isn't considered canon i think it's more of an alternative timeline? so that doesn't really count.

me personally i think daruk and urbosa are very mother and father, and they probably were if riju and yunobo are their direct descendants (which is a whole other rabbit hole in itself; urbosa and daruk died most likely leaving little children and spouses behind ㅠㅠ). and maybe that is the point; daruk is the rock (because he's a goron lol) that keeps the family together and in the botw memories is seen to be taking initiative to lead and tell the other champions to get to their divine beasts when the calamity awakens. he’s steadfast and encouraging and jovial and that’s very father of him! as for urbosa, she straight up mothers zelda and link in-game, she's basically zelda's maternal figure after zelda's mom dies. she's not a stepmom, she's the mother that stepped up 💪❤️

mipha bears the Eldest Daughter Curse™ and revali is the moody teenager who’s Not going through a phase, it’s a LIFESTYLE MOM!!!1!1!1!1 and imo link and zelda kinda give goofy twin siblings (imagine like the pine twins) vibes to me

i like the headcanon that link had a younger sister pre-calamity, but i’d like to add my own twist to that. assuming that link used to live in hateno village, what if link's parents split after the birth of his younger sister, with his father taking link and moving closer to hyrule castle to fulfill his duty as a knight, and his mother not wanting to get involved with the war against the calamity and taking his sister to stay in hateno? link must have been really young at the time and barely remembers being able to play with his little sister :( so even if he had a sibling, he was basically raised alone for most of his life. and if his father was a knight of hyrule, i doubt that he could have been the most present father to link either... with zelda's mother dying when she was young and her father being a complete dick, that makes both link and zelda the "only child" kids that were raised in less than desirable familial conditions. and so, i think link and zelda would have their own difficulties integrating into this found family dynamic with the champions.

now i'm not an only child (i have demons for siblings tbh), but i think both link and zelda are very independent people who feel like they can only rely and trust themselves with the way they've been raised. it takes a lot for both of them to learn to be vulnerable and trust others, and they're very much not used to the mismatched deck of personalities they have to deal with within the champions, that being jolly father daruk, very cutthroat mother urbosa, sweet and soft-spoken mipha, and dickhead ass bitch bird revali. how can they navigate through these relationships with their lonely childhoods swept up in prophecies of old? it's much easier than you think and it has to do with anon's idea: strengthening rapport with each other by singing together atop a divine beast >:]

ok i'm joking, i think that's more the apex of the roadmap to becoming a found family, but it's a very cute idea 🥺 after link and zelda are finally cool with each other, there are so many opportunities for each of them to bond with the other champions individually. there's of course zelda falling asleep on mama urbosa in vah naboris, link and daruk have their father-son bonding time by daruk protecting link from getting smashed to a pulp by volcanic boulders, etc etc, but what about mipha taking zelda to all the monuments that detail zora history throughout the domain so that zelda can study them? what about revali teaching link how to use the paraglider so that he can actually hit targets at the flight range and get a chance to finally settle the score between him and link? i actually like that idea a lot, because then we could get an explanation as to why the paraglider even exists in the botw universe (revalink for the win ehehe). nintendo, my dear friend, there could be so much more to this world that you've introduced to us.

on one hand, of course botw is narratively focused on link and zelda and calamity ganon, and mechanically about the open-world map, shrines/divine beasts, etc, that break free from traditional zelda conventions. but it leaves the champions to only be side characters that, though they played critical roles in handling the divine beasts, are nothing more than ghostly figures with a handful of one-dimensional character traits that only create a further disconnect between the current world of hyrule vs. its pre-calamity past. which is why we get champion's ballad and age of calamity, which both somewhat expands on the champions as characters, but never more than giving them a few more traits and interactions that, to me personally, feel empty and inadequate. i want to have these intimate interactions with the champions as characters in the botw map, ones that i can walk up to chat with as though they were sidon or beedle or a random npc traveler. i want to feel close to the champions, and nintendo, though with weak attempts, doesn't give me that.

the picture that purah takes of the champions is so important to me. this right here is peak found family, a group of the most mismatched individuals that somehow meld perfectly together and balance each other out, and we only receive it through the DLC. that's so stupid. sorry nintendo, i want more than three minute long memories of a singular moment in a past life, i want more than npcs telling me who i used to be. i want king dorephan to tell us about the time zelda fell off of a waterfall and mipha immediately jumped after her to save her clumsy ass. i want to look through historical records of the gerudo and find one about urbosa launching daruk at the mouth of a molduking and daruk chewing her out for it later. i want elder kaneli gossip with me about an old rumor about how revali and the hylian champion of the past used to be found asleep together on the floor of the flight range's hut after a long night of training. i want the world of botw to give me signs and stories about how close the champions were with each other and to make my heart ache, to wish desperately to have known them, instead of like, 20 memories that only serve the plot, or honestly don't at all. but i digress!

i know for some people, the presence of the champions were meant to teach link about tragedy and loss and the effect of war and ruin and evil and cherishing your loved ones or whatever, but i simply did not get that message. that was not what i perceived the champions to be, because to me, the game lacked showing the relationships link and zelda had with the champions. like okay, you died and you also happened to know me. what if link doesn't really remember them at all? then what?

you receive twenty or so memories about the champions when including the DLC, and yes i do concede it gives us some more insight about their characters, but it doesn't do much more than that. the cutscene where mipha moves vah ruta to ready its lasers at the castle, where she wishes to see her father and sidon one more time, especially is an excellent example of emphasizing their significance to the people around them, to us as players and spectators to this hyrule... i want more of that.

i could be wrong about some of the stuff i've said, so disclaimer again that i haven't played the DLC or age of calamity, and maybe you do feel closer to the champions when you play those games! fanmade fic and art and headcanons have been really great ways of helping me view them in a multi-dimensional way, but going off the game's content itself, the champions feel like hollow spectres of people we never truly remember or get to know. maybe that's what they're supposed to feel like, but i don't want to feel that way about them. i'm too attached to them now, and i want to get to know them! curse you nintendo!!!

[keter-class-anomaly]

I’ve been pondering on Pokémon a lot lately but I don’t think I can like. Properly get into the fandom because I can absolutely not force myself to sit down and play a video game for more than five minutes.

[zip-toonz]

Trevor in splatoon

[coveredinmetaldust]

Since everyone is posting these right now, here are my top 25 games to get to know me / top 25 favorite/ 25 most influential games for me specifically. (My list is in no particular order.) Here's the link to make one.

[soulstuffjunkie]

Nothing like watching your sweet sensei take apart Vaati without batting an eye.

I saw that reference image and IMMEDIATELY knew what I had to do with it. I’ve been working on this for an AGE and I know the og image says Super Mario Land but I figured it was a good time to shout out my favourite GBA game of all time, 🦆Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap🦆. I first played it multiple times to completion on the PSP and then later on a GBA emulator on my pc after our PSP died on us. I still love it to bits to this day 💖

Also you can see how I figured I liked the image more when it was flipped and then had to flip Kakashi’s hair and scar to be accurate. Also drew myself a little Kakashi face ✨as a treat✨ before I covered it with the mask

[ID: Naruto fanart of genin Team 7 plus Kakashi crowding around Iruka, who's playing on a Game Boy with an eyebrow raised. The kids look intense and impressed, Kakashi's leaning down to watch with an arm around Sakura, and Iruka's hair is down. The background is taken from Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap. Image two zooms in further on everyone's faces.

Image three is the reference, a photo of four kids standing around their mother on a Gameboy, captioned "A mom helping her kids beat a hard level in Super Mario Land, 1990s." The last three images are progress photos of the art. End ID] (many many thanks to @princess-of-purple-prose for the description, I’ll add these to what I have up and to the rest of my art too, going forward!)

[ganondoodle]

so im am trying to drown out my dreams of a zelda game of my AU (bc you know that will never happen even tho it fits so perfectly with my AU lore and the gamplay style of botw and its gnawing on me more and more) with redoing the sprites i made as a concept for that building pixel game i also dream of making

should i make a seperate blog for pixel art/actual gamedev ?

[mechaknight-98]

No Return (NSFW) FT: Sakura Miyawaki

Authors note: Sakura is hot and likes the nerdy stuff I like, but she is also an exceptionally talented idol who deserves all of the best and one of my top biasses. I just didn't know what to write for her until this popped in my head

Part II

I sat down to play Warframe with my friend “FearlessKura98” She was waiting for me despite the time difference. I was a bit early so the typical hour we usually played together was extended.

“Yo kkura what's up.” I greet her in Japanese when I see her name pop up on the voice chat.

“Oh Daigo you're Japanese sounds so good now,” she replies in English. I smiled and replied “So does your English Kkura.” there was silence but I assumed it was just due to Kkura smiling. As you set up you hear a massive crash.

“What was that?” Kkura asked

“I don't know but I'll be right back,” I say to Kkura.

“Daigo be careful,” Kkura responded.

“Will do Kkura,” I say. I get up and walk outside to a very different world than before

3 years later.

I sat on the plane to Tokyo anxiety stricken. A kaiju could attack at any time and the defense force had consistently proven itself to be “unreliable.”

I was going under the code name Juzo to help a recently established Kaiju strike team; that was having trouble with the new batch of EVO kaiju that had been popping up lately. I was unsure of my effectiveness but the chance to visit Japan with no other strings attached was too much of an opportunity to miss so Otrimi and I made the flight. It was a long flight and upon landing both Otrimi and I were certainly restless but hey we got there safely. At the airport, Otrimi and I were picked up by a pretty brunette.

“Hi Juzo San.” the young lady said

“Hello Mrs…”

“Oh call me Sakura.” the young lady said. I nod and we follow her into a nearby car. Otrimi walks over to Sakura who immediately falls for his charms. “Oh, who's a good boy? Sit.” she says as she pets him “his fur is so soft.” she adds as she turns to me

“Hey Juzo-san what's his name?”Sakura asks.

“Otrimi,” I answer

“O-Tri-Mi?” she asked she nods

“You're English is Good,” I say to her.

“Thanks!” she said elated, “my friend I used to play games with helped me,” she added.

“Oh, that's how I learned Japanese,” I reply with a bemused tone as we get into the car. Otrimi took the back. His tail wagging happily. Sakura raised an eyebrow and then switched to her maternal tongue.

“Oh really?” Sakura asks

“Yeah my skills are lackluster but I can somewhat read and write it,” I respond

“Well, you sound good. You have a bit of a Kagoshima dialect like me but whoever taught you did a good job” Sakura says with a smile.

“Thanks” I reply.

As we drove I remembered she said she played Games

“You Sakura. You mentioned you play games what games do you play?”

“Mostly smash bros on my switch and Zelda.”

“Oh, nice. We should play together.” I say. Sakura smiled and replied

“Wow whoever taught had a thick Kagoshima dialect.” sakura affirmed I laughed with her as she began to crack up. We arrived at the facility where the dorms, training center, and rejuvenating springs were. Sakura leads Otrimi and me through the facility. There seemed to be a lot of faces and people working to put an end to the invaders and kaiju threat we faced. Otrimi and I were on edge as we walked through the facility. The intense glare of several faces kinda puts me on edge. Unfortunately, Sakura had to say the following,

“So everyone is excited to meet you,” Sakura said reassuringly as if sending my tension.

“Oh, the dirty side glares made me feel welcome,” I replied sarcastically

“Wait really?” she asked surprised. I nodded and as if on cue a young woman with red hair came up and said

“Sakura who is this?” the girl said in high-defense mode

“Oh this is Juzo he's from the La Brea Institute of Kaiju Studies.” sakura explained

“But why does he look like an invader?” she asked coldly

“Well, being abducted and placed into their evolution vats, then being forced to fight in their flesh pits for 6 months kinda changes you a bit,” I reply. The red hair girl looked down embarrassed when she noticed Otrimi.

“Oh he's so cute.” the redhead said as she bent down to pet my Aragami. Otrimi eased under her touch and then she looked back at me

“My name is Yunjin and Sorry about my rudeness earlier. It's just no one has ever seen the mysterious Juzo before, but hears tales of this mighty Kaiju slayer. I expected you to be older.”

“I'm 26 which feels pretty old,” I reply

Yunjin’s eyes go wide “Oh Sakura chan he's the same age as Dahyun, Jisun, Jiwon, and you.” sakura nods in surprise. Ad Sakura’s tour continues

“So Sakura how did you get into all of this?” I ask curiously

“Well, I was an idol before this.”

“Oh, what kind?”

“K-pop,” Sakura said with a smile

I raised an eyebrow “Oh that's super interesting.” I replied

“Thanks and you?” Sakura

“Oh um well I was an urban photographer,” I answer. Sakura nods intrigued as we continue to make small talk. As we move through the facility a wave of familiar comfort crashes into me as I talk to Sakura. It felt as if I had known her forever.

Eventually, the little tour comes to an end. We arrived at a dorm and Sakura opened it.

“Welcome to your new home for the time being,” she said. I look around

“Get comfortable tomorrow is going to be busy for you tomorrow.” she teased. I nod and Sakura leaves before she can get too far I walk out to her

“Wait Sakura,” I yell.

She turns back to me with eyes full of surprise, she asks “Oh, Juzo what's up?”

“Thanks for helping me out today and picking me up today,” I said.

Sakura smiles bright and says as she waves goodbye “Have a good one, but just one.”

I furrow my eyebrows in recognition because I only know one person who uses that phrase. To confirm my suspicion I follow up with, “ya know that's quite presumptuous of you. What if I want to have a good two or 3?” Sakura turns around with eyes even wider and more surprised.

“Daigo?” was all she questioned. I tilt my head to the left and smile, “You are fearless.” I responded. Kura ran to me and gave me a tight hug.

“It's been so long.” she sighed as she melted into my arms. I wrapped my arms around her

“Yeah, it has,” I respond, and for a moment time stops I am not the Kaiju slayer Juzo but I'm the young man Daigo who loves to play video games with his friends and take funny pictures. I try not to cry but a few tears streak down my face.

I looked down to see Kura was in a similar situation. We smile at each other and I'm just overcome by emotions I tilt her face up and I kiss her. She pushes me back into my room before she breaks the kiss and locks the door.

“I want no distractions,” she said hungrily. Then pushes me onto the bed where she kisses me again. She caresses my face. My arms slide up and down her waste unsure of where to move or how to go.

“Wow you're green,” she teased as she came up for air between kisses.

“In sorry I haven't dated while being in an almost one-man war for the past year and a half.” Sakura chuckled and shook her head

“No like your lines are green. They were dark brown before,” she said laughing to prove her point she moved my hand to her chest and I could see the teal lines over my arms.

“Oh yeah they change colors,” I said embarrassed.

“I like it,” Sakura said as she smiled before bringing me into another kiss. I felt her tongue give an exploratory poke into my mouth she broke this kiss and looked at me. “Tell me everything,” she said as pupils grew to the size of dinner plates as she lifted her shirt. I quickly get the memo and undress. sakura smiles

“So after I last talked to you I walked outside to see the invaders (they refer to themselves as Carnothians) abducting people. I tried to run but was grabbed by one and then everything got muddy until after the evolution pits.” I say as Sakura and I reconnect. My hands caress her perky breasts and she moans. She grinds her sex on mine as our bodies connect for the first time.

“You're bigger than I thought.” Sakura cokes. I groan and reply

“You're so tight.” Sakura giggles as she begins to grind a bit harder. I groan again overwhelmed by all the sensations and emotional build-up. Sakura looks at my eyes with a somber but happy look.

As I thrust in and out of her she said, “I thought you died. I felt so alone. We'd been playing together for 3 years and then you went and disappeared. I never touched Warframe again. I couldn't. the pain was too much to bear.” she said as she went for a particularly deep rut.

“Oh god yes!” she yelled as she ruffled her hair. She threw her head back as she pushed me flat onto the bed. “Squeeze my tits and tell me about the Flesh pits.” she groaned sensually.

I began to remember and my body lurched and not in a good way. Sakura noticed and asked “What's wrong ?” she looked down to see my lines change from a tranquil teal to a chaotic crimson, as my mind flashed back. Before anything else could escalate I lifted Sakura off of me. She tried to stop me but couldn't. Most likely due to the gap in strength. Sakura looks at me confused and a little hurt until she sees the torment in my features.

“I'm sorry I didn't mean to push too hard” Kura exclaimed

I shrug and respond, “It's fine kura. I just…am not ready to talk about it right now.”

“No, I get it. I mean your lines changed. I felt and saw the change.” Sakura reassured me. I smiled and kissed her forehead.

Sakura rolled her eyes, “I didn't take you for the sappy type.”

“Oh, I'm very much the sentimental type.” I fired back and Kura smiled.

“Gosh I missed you, you big dummy,” Kura said with a smile. She nestled to my side to cuddle. I pulled the blanket over us as we lay in the bed together.

“We are going to finish what we started” Sakura muttered

“Deal,” I said Kura turned to face me and kissed my nose. She then moved my hands to her breasts again as she turned around.

“I know you like them” Kura teased

“I mean what straight guy doesn't.” I defend, “You also have a nice butt too” I add. Kura smiles

“Thanks, pervert.” Kura teased

“Nah you started this.” I retaliate as I nestle closer to her. I rest my chin on her right shoulder and she keeps me close. I kiss her cheek as we sit tight together. “This is so weird”

“Why?” Kura asked

“I would've never imagined my gaming pal would be such a beauty,” I answered. Kira smiled then turned to me and we started kissing again.

After an hour of cuddling and kissing my stomach growled. Kura had her tongue down my throat as winning our tug-of-war match. I had been rock hard and waiting for the green light to go to the next step

as she said, “Okay let's try this again.” Kura’s stomach growled. I chuckled

“Okay well let's get food before we defile each other. I joke sakura gives me a toothy grin as she gets up, and for some reason, the way her perfect ass gently sways triggers something in me. Something old something ancient something primal. I got up. Smacked Kura’s perfect ass and slid my cock into her tight snatch.

“Oh yes,” Kura moaned. As rested her hands on my desk. I grabbed Kura’s soft waist and thrust hard and deep. Kura yelped with Joy. “Yes claim this slutty pussy.” she said as I thrust again. By the thrust, she was a moaning mess and she came, but before I could finish there was a knock on the door. Kura and I looked at each other before she raced to my bathroom and handed me my sweatpants and t-shirt. I open the door to see Yunjin waiting patiently.

“Hey, have you seen Sakura? She was supposed to meet me for lunch and never showed,”

I didn't know Sakura’s reputation or the rules of interpersonal relationships here so I employed tactical omissions of details or TOOD for short (patent pending) “I don't know where Kura Chan is right at this moment.” Yunjin eyes me suspicious

“Kura chan?” she asked

“Yeah, Kura Chan.” I affirmed

“You know only one person calls well called her that,” Yunjin said

“Really who?” I asked

“Well, apparently you Daigo.” Yunjin teased

My eyes widened and I told Yunjin to keep it on the hush.

“Don't worry Don't worry your secret is safe with me. (she leans into my room) hey Sakura are we still on for JJK tonight?” Yunjin asked My bathroom opened and Kura gave Yunjin an annoyed look.

“You couldn't let me have this?” she asked annoyed

“Not a chance. For all the times you caught me linking with Tobi it seemed fair to give a little of that back.” Yunjin said

“They were accidents” Kura stated. Yunjin rolled her eyes.

“Bring Daigo and snacks,” she said before leaving. I closed the door and Sakura huffed

“It was 2 times.” she huffed

“Kura it's okay” I reassure her

[blue-likethebird]

Reusing the memory system from botw for the tears of the dragon storyline in totk was such a terrible decision on so many different levels that it’s honestly kind of impressive.

While the botw memory system had flaws of its own, there was one small but significant thing that worked in its favour: botw’s memories were largely separate from the main plot in the past, and have absolutely no bearing on the story being told in the present. Aside from a few specific instances (ie the calamity striking, the ceremony, Link and Zelda becoming closer) the memories are all self-contained moments that emphasize character development over driving the story. Because there’s no major narrative throughline between them, it gives players more freedom to discover in any order regardless of how much they’ve progressed through the main quest without running the risk of stumbling across a memory that ruins something else later on in the game.

(This got long so the rest of my analysis is going under the cut.)

The biggest change between the memories from botw and the dragon’s tears from totk is definitely what kind of information these cutscenes relay to you as the player. Botw’s memories are primarily snapshots of small interpersonal moments that hold very little significance to the greater narrative taking place in the past. Totk’s memories are the greater narrative. With only one major exception -that I’ll touch on in a sec-, every cutscene in the dragon’s tears shows a crucial moment of story development with no time left to explore the characters driving that story forwards. There’s no organic moment revealing, say, a quirk of Rauru’s that Mineru finds annoying, or Sonia’s sense of humour, or any of our literal Main Villain Ganondorf’s motivations for going to war with Hyrule. If there’s any moments of character focus they only happen in ways that advance the plot (meaning the only real character focus is on the characters totk wants the entire universe to orbit around, namely Rauru and Zelda), and as such it’s harder to bring myself to care about what happens to anyone.

To illustrate the point I’m trying to make here, compare the memories of the champions Link regains during the divine beast quests to the conversations with the ancient sages at the end of each temple. The memories make passing mentions of the ongoing preparations for the calamity, but the real purpose of those scenes is to showcase who the champions were as people before their deaths and give us a reason to mourn them, even though we know at the start of our journey that they’re all long gone. In contrast, the conversations with the ancient sages are all about the events of the imprisoning war and their promise to Zelda that their descendants will come to Link’s aid in the future, very obviously copy pasted for each of the five times that cutscene is brought up (which is a particularly egregious moment of bad quest design but that’s a rant for another time) in such a way that none of the 5 incarnations of that cutscene reveal anything new about the ancient sages as characters, to the point where none of them even show their faces. I care about Daruk because the game shows me that he cares deeply about the wellbeing of his fellow champions and brings out the best in others. So why should I care about the nameless, faceless sage of water? What’s there to move me about their struggles if my only interactions with the sages are a series of exposition dumps? If the game can’t give me a reason to sincerely care about its main characters, the whole rest of the story is meaningless.

(As an aside, I get the feeling someone on the dev team caught on to the issue I’m describing here, because the tea party memory sticks out like a sore thumb from the rest of the dragon tear cutscenes. It’s such a jarring change of pace to have the otherwise plot-heavy dragon’s tears come screeching to a halt for a scene where Sonia sits down with Zelda to have a cute little tea party and talk about absolutely nothing of significance that the whole thing almost seems like it was hastily tacked on to the story later. Given that the next (chronological) memory sees Sonia fall victim to an unceremonious death by chiropractor, it feels like someone realized that Sonia really doesn’t do or say much in the scenes before she dies and threw together the tea party scene so players would have at least one moment to look back on fondly when she’s fridged. But I digress)

The story told in the dragon’s tears is a highly linear one. But the open-ended nature of botw’s memory system remains, meaning that these tears can be found and viewed in any order. At first this doesn’t seem so bad, since the first two tears you’re likely to find if you follow the game’s intended path are also the chronological first and second of the memories you can discover through these geoglyph tears. But after those first two, the game kinda gives up on guiding you towards these tears in a way that flows well with the story they wrote: the closest tear geographically to the two the game initially guides you towards correlates to one of the penultimate scenes of that entire storyline, while the next scene chronologically is found almost halfway across the map. As such, it’s all but guaranteed that you’ll spoil yourself in some way without using either a guide or the (somewhat unintuitive and never fully explained by the game) little map in the forgotten temple. Finding memories in order didn’t matter so much in botw because the scenes you could find still worked well as standalone scenes before you discovered every memory and pieced together the full picture, and the game is never trying to surprise me about the characters’ fates at the end of this storyline: hell the first memory you’re guided to shows the calamity striking. But in contrast, viewing a dragon’s tear at the wrong time can completely ruin the story they’re trying to tell in those cutscenes. During my playthrough, for example, the first tear I found after the game stopped guiding me to them showed Ganondorf removing Sonia’s stone from her dead body. At this point I had known Sonia existed for all of like an hour, so every subsequent appearance she made was ruined for me by the fact that I already knew she was nothing but cannon fodder to be killed off for the sake of another character’s pain (Rauru and Zelda a-fucking-gain). I expected to be pissed that it was so easy to spoil myself, or maybe sad in passing that a character with her potential was so underutilized, but instead I just felt… tired. I wasn’t even halfway to the first settlement and already I was completely numb to the story the game was trying to tell.

But the worst was yet to come. And oh boy was it ever a low point for storytelling in the Zelda series. Remember how I said up above that the memories in botw had no connection to the story in the present? Let’s just say the same cannot be said for the dragon’s tears.

It’s May 2023. I’ve just finished the sage of wind questline. I still have hope that the story the game is trying to tell will be good. Deciding that I’ll go to Goron city next, I head towards the Thyplo skyview tower to expand my map, catch a glimpse of a nearby geoglyph from the air, and glide over to check it out. This geoglyph shows me a memory that not only recaps the entire dragon tear storyline, but also ends on a bit of foreshadowing about Zelda’s fate that’s about as subtle as a brick to the fucking face. By exploring -the thing the game claims it prioritized above all else in the design of its world and quests- I’d once again been hit with spoilers for a major story detail.

My main objective in this game is to find Zelda. It’s the only driving factor behind my journey towards all these different regions. The current big mystery I’m supposed to solve is why Zelda’s causing so much hell for the people of Hyrule. I now knew exactly where she was and what the deal with her appearances in other parts of Hyrule was, and I’d found it completely by accident by doing something the game says over and over again that it wants me to do. Unlike with Sonia’s death, this time I was a mess of emotions. I was pissed the fuck off that this open-world game had punished me twice already for trying to explore. More than that, I was disappointed that a game I had been so excited to play, from a series I had so many fond memories of, had let me down like this. With every subsequent quest where the sages and I chased a Zelda I knew was fake to our next objective, and every NPC wondering where she was that I couldn’t tell the truth to, that disappointment grew. The entire rest of the main story was ruined for me before I had progressed past 1/4th of the regional quests and a third of the dragon’s tears. There was no more sense of anticipation or mystery. I finished the rest of the game with a bitter taste in my mouth and haven’t touched it again since.

Do I think this story could have been good? Honestly, I don’t know, and by now I don’t really care either (that’s a lie. I care so so much and that’s probably why I hate totk as much as I do). But it’s all irrelevant, because like Cinderella’s stepsister cutting off her own heel so she can cram her foot into a glass slipper that’s never going to fit, totk is sabotaged by the devs’ insistence that everything fit itself into a world they custom-made for botw. This isn’t a new formula that the series is following, it’s Nintendo slapping a new coat of paint on an existing skeleton, and I’m not optimistic to see what this particular approach has in store for the Zelda series. Especially not at the price they’re charging for it.

[blackautmedia]

Thinking about how Twilight Princess runs with the idea of Link being good with and gentle around animals. Dude is a farmhand, the local wildlife all knows he's the Wolf and are happy to help him.

The game makes an explicit comparison to Link applying his farming skills in combat.

The game has major segments around teaming up with Epona for the horseback missions.

His quest would have been cut short had it not been for the animals trusting him as someone to help them while they save him in the forest temple considering you need their help to navigate the temple and fight the boss.

It's easy to forget that Link's love and gentleness toward animals is one of his major strengths that carries him through Twilight Princess.

Link will summon Hawks, he has the power to talk to animals, team up with Monkeys, get info about the city from the pets there, I love it.

It's easy to focus on all the dark elements of Twilight Princess, but there's a lot to appreciate about Link insisting on spending time playing and talking with a bunch of cats.

TP Link is a strong and honestly ruthless dude not above using dark magic to save the day, but he's going to make sure those bugs all make it to the ball, damn it.

The game made that wild backstory interloper cutscene, but it also took the time to change Link's facial expression so he smiles when he picks up cats and dogs like they're babies.

There are several characters who draw attention to Link's sharp, ferocious eyes like a beast. But then Link will also get hit on by a chicken.

Shame the game didn't make a sidequest with you and Epona since you can talk to her, but just as well. This is one of my favorite Zelda games for a reason.